2009-Feb-28 - New start in a big pond
It's been 3 months now since I joined a new company. I’m still getting used to it. I mean, there are so many differences between working as a QA in an SMB like my previous company, and a huge enterprise like my current employer.
- New hire guidance
In my previous company, which is much smaller, they are able to provide a clear list of “What to do” for new hire, like whom you should contact if you are in some situation, or where you can seek help when you are in some another situation.
My current employer provided a first day orientation, which propagandized company culture, and gave us a website, which surely contains all the information we need yet it’s too huge. My direct manager did most of the other orientation job afterwards, but some information he provided was either outdated or conflicted with what HR said later. I was confused sometimes, trying hard to figure them out myself.
- Organization
My previous company is simpler, from director, to XXX managers, to developers and QA engineers, straightforward, and people know each other. One RD team works on one project, developers program and QAs test.
My current employer is much more complicated. Different kinds of teams, different kinds of roles, even QA has several categories, focusing on different kinds of testing on the same project. I always wonder if we will miss anything in the cracks between these QA teams.
- Process
The previous company has an SQA team that supervises the product development cycle to make sure it adheres to process. They involve in requirement review, design review, plan review, and then after release, they analyze the testing data and do postmortem.
Now we do not have this kind of force in my company. We are working on many small releases of old products, and have short time span and not very strict process. No hard test coverage requirement, how many tests to do depend on QA’s experience and developer’s suggestion. Bug priority at 3 or lower are sometimes ignored, and product goes on releasing. Usability, UI, comprehensive messages are not a bit in consideration. Nobody cares about that because there are so many projects on one’s hand at the same time.
- Culture
In my previous small company, employees’ race, age, experience, and even character are close. We worked together, played games together, and even rent an apartment and lived together. It’s pretty simple, and people like each other.
In a big old company like the one I’m in today, we have so many colleagues from different countries, in different age, and have different experiences. People do not hang out a lot after work. They don’t see each other even working on the same floor. They prefer conference call than physical show up. In a team meeting, if one’s not aggressive enough, he would have no chance to chip in, because there always are talkative members out there that really show they are involved.
The good thing is, in a big company, you always have something new to learn, either from projects, or from the coworkers.
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